We’re all just trying to get our smoothie on in the summer, but singer Jordan Brown of Set Your Goals sets the record straight on one of their most popular songs about a popular ex-smoothie spot in Augusta, Georgia. From their sophomore record This Will Be the Death of Us via Epitaph Records, “Summer Jam” encapsulates the raspberry coolest story ever told. No pun intended. Brown lets us in on how the dudes in Fireworks and Set Your Goals got in trouble with the law when they were just trying to get their smoothie on, dog.
I’m dying to ask and the people need to know. Where did “I’m just trying to get my smoothie on, dog” come from?
We played a show in Augusta, Georgia and we went to the mall the next day. Augusta is really barren, it’s not at all like Atlanta. We were at the mall with Fireworks and we walked by a smoothie shop called Raspberry Cool. One of the guys working there was at the show and they said, “hey, great show, do you guys want free smoothies?” Of course we said, “yeah, we’d love free smoothies.” We’re all hanging out and Fireworks are super fun, they bring out the wild craziness in us. They have all of this energy. They started chanting “Raspberry Cool, Raspberry Cool!” A very subtle baseball chant that got louder and louder. It was mostly moms and their daughters and they were all coming up to us like, “you guys play in a band? That’s so cool!” They loved the chant, but then all of the sudden this deputy sheriff walks over and says, “it’s time to leave.”
Everyone thought he was mall security at first, but then more of them showed up and we realized they were affiliated with law enforcement. We were arguing with them, of course [laughs], not willing to leave the mall. We were having fun, we were trying to explain to them why we were singing. It’s not like we were throwing chairs or anything. The parents started to get really scared and I felt bad for them most of all because they didn’t know what was going on and [vouched for us]. The police put us in a single-file line trying to make an example out of us– kids with black shirts and tattoos that are obviously not from the area. They tried marching us out of the mall and there was an exit so we tried to leave. Before we could [book it to the exit], one of the officers grabbed my arm and everything I was holding spilled all over the floor.
I threw my hands up and said, “what is going on!” That was an immediate hostility trigger and they cuffed me right away [laughs]. Tymm [Rengers] from Fireworks [shouted], “oh my god, they’re arresting everyone!” Then they put all of us in handcuffs and put us in cruisers. They had to call in [backup]from the station. The Fireworks merchandiser’s name is Tony Bologna and he actually got away. We all ended up, being all 17 of us, in this jail cell waiting to post bail and while I was sitting in the cop car I noticed we were by a dumpster. It was pretty sketchy looking back now, this cop could’ve done anything and nobody would’ve seen it. I was sitting there and through the crack in the door by the dumpster I see him run by [us]laughing at me. It was something out of a movie.
We had [the cop]on the record. The lyrics, “I’m in Georgia with Fireworks and Justin K, but somehow Bologna got away.” That’s Bologna on the record saying “I’m just trying to get my smoothie on, dog.” That’s all he was trying to do, he wasn’t trying to get arrested [laughs]. If you go to this jail in Augusta, if anyone gets arrested and sent there, someone had a coin on them and we ended up carving “SYG FIREWORKS ‘07” into the cinders of the cell.
Set Your Goals performing “Summer Jam” at Riot Fest Chicago 2016
Catch the dudes of Set Your Goals on tour this fall for the 10 year anniversary of their first album, Mutiny! and with Good Charlotte on select dates.
